Thoughts on life and death
A friend of mine once said that there's no such thing as "saving a person's life." There's only putting off death. She meant that no matter how much we think of ourselves and our medical tech, eventually everyone dies. She felt it was arrogant to talk about "saving lives".
I look at the subject-heading of my last post, and a part of me wonders if that sounds too arrogant. But I disagreed with her when she first said it, and I still disagree. To me, the difference between saving a life and "putting off" a death is one of creation. It's an energetic, soul inspired creation that pours life and harmony into someone who is losing it from themselves.
It's just as true, I think, to say that we saved someone's life by listening to them in times of crisis as it is to shock a person's heart back into rhythm. We are donating our life force and will and shoring up their crumbling reserves, our souls are speaking to theirs and it doesn't matter if the heart beats ten more times or ten hundred thousand more; for the length of time that we freely give of our heart and selves, we are creating life. We are saving a life.
Equally, it's true that we can go through the motions of cardiac resuscitation, and if there's no spark of joyous giving, only anxious fear of what we're about to lose, then it's not life saving. THAT's death being delayed. When we accept that death will come, and set about with the intention of giving our loved ones, or ourselves, the best of what remains to us - that's life. When we try to claw and cling to life, when we try to rip another from death's door because we must NOT lose, well, you know what I'm gonna say. Not life. Nope.
I wonder if this thought that I've had will make sense to her when I try to explain it? I wonder if this isn't something you can tell, but something that has to be felt? I wonder how I can show her that it's not arrogance at all, but a fierce, uncompromising gratefulness that one has added to one's own life even as we add to another's?
And now I'm just rambling. Seems I've finally wound down enough to sleep. 'Night all.